The invention relates chiefly to a chamber with an air humidification device.
The preservation of various products as well as the proper working of an apparatus requires a degree of hydometry to be maintained. Maintaining the desired hydrometry may make it necessary either to reduce the quantity of water vapor present in the air by cooling or desiccation or, as in the present invention, to humidify air.
In the device according to the present invention, evaporation is favored by maximizing the exchange surfaces and effecting a trickling of water in the chamber to be humidified. The device according to the present invention can be applied to any closed chamber, notably to chambers for the preservation of products, as well as to dwellings. The invention can be applied particularly to refrigerated chambers. Among refrigerated chambers, chambers designed to keep bottled wine, for example, require a very high rate of humidity. This high rate of humidity enables, in particular, the wine to be isolated from external influences by causing the cork to swell up. Chambers of this type, marketed as "wine cellars", keep a constant temperature in the vicinity of 12.degree. enabling the wine to age well.
In the device according to the invention, water is advantageously placed in a vessel at the bottom of the chamber. This device enables evaporation and facilitates the levelling of the tank. In closed, refrigerated chambers, water tends to get condensed, in forming frost on the evaporator and/or expander. During defrosting, for example by the use of a heating resistor, the frost goes into liquid phase. The device according to the present invention has guiding means enabling the water to trickle and thus promoting its evaporation.
Advantageously, the guiding device has projecting portions and regions with negative inclination favoring evaporation through an increase in the exchange surface, through the formation of cascades and/or the modification of the flow.
Thus, in a refrigerated chamber, the dehydration, caused by the presence of the cold element consisting of the expander, is compensated for.
A main object of the invention is a chamber such as the one described in claims 1 to 10.